Some 1,900 Italian doctors and dentists have been suspended from the country’s professional association because they haven’t complied with a law requiring them to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19, including having a booster shot.
Italy requires all health care workers, teachers, police, armed forces members and those who provide services to nursing home residents to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. It also requires all people 50 or older to be fully vaccinated or recently recovered from the illness in order to access services such as public transport.
Health care workers must receive the booster in order to be fully compliant, according to a law decreed by the Italian government last month.
Suspending the unvaccinated from the doctor’s professional federation “isn’t meant to be punitive,” Filippo Anelli, federation president, said in a statement. “The aim is, as the law says, to protect public health and maintain adequate conditions of safety in providing care.”